NHL: Devils' Brodeur shuts out Flyers

New Jersey Devils' Martin Brodeur (30) blocks a shot by Philadelphia Flyers' Sean Couturier (14) during the second period of an NHL hockey game, Thursday, April 18, 2013, in Philadelphia. New Jersey won 3-0. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

PHILADELPHIA — Marty Brodeur has had plenty of games against the Flyers in his long career as a prime-time Devil, and lots of them were as devoid of entertainment as Thursday night’s dump-and-defend borefest was at Wells Fargo Center.

Just like the old days, Brodeur’s biggest battle during the game was his personal fight to stay awake, as his Devils teammates locked, blocked and rocked the Flyers 3-0. That puts the Flyers’ magic number at 2 – two more points by the Rangers or any other flops by the Flyers and their non-playoff nightmare will have become official.

As it was, everybody knew coming in that for the first time in ... well, ever ... the Flyers and the Devils appeared to be headed together for early springs. To match that state of competitive inertia, the game was about 25 minutes old and essentially nothing had happened.

Eventually, the Devils would rectify that with goals by Ryan Carter and Matt D’Agostini, before Adam Henrique empty-net nail with 1:13 left sent all 200 or so fans left in the seats streaming for the doors.

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For yuks, every Flyers fan should know that coming into this game, the Devils had lost 10 games in a row. Yes, the defending Eastern Conference champion Devils who knocked the Flyers out of the playoffs last spring.

What a difference a short year makes.

As for Brodeur-vs.-Philly, nothing much changes. The 40-year-old goalie scored his 11th career shutout against the Flyers. He has more shutouts against them than any other team, and he has more shutouts against them than any other goalie.

Brodeur, the prototypical Devil, had been stuck during his team’s 0-6-4 backslide on 666 career victories.

Cue the crazies.

But there was nothing weird about this game. Just a lot of boring.

What was a relatively even, uneventual and uninteresting game took a turn in the second period, however, when the Flyers took off toward Brodeur on a 3-on-1 break. But along the way, Matt Read appeared to have some sort of brain cramp.

He stickhandled into the Devils zone, had easy chances to pass or shoot ... and did neither.

A blink of the eye later, Simon Gagne came upon the puck in the neutral zone, and Simon Gagne also hesitated before shoveling a quick pass toward Erik Gustafsson. But Stephen Gionta knocked it astray and got it to Ryan Carter, who promptly put a shot off the top part of Ilya Bryzgalov’s stick and into the net at 5:36 for a 1-0 Devils lead.

And after that ... not much happened again.

One thing that did was a Jakub Voracek goal, coming at 9:04 of the second period. It lasted for one short cheer until a replay confirmed that Voracek not only kicked it in, but hit it like a soccer-style kicker.

As far as actually scoring by putting a stick on a puck, two Flyers power plays didn’t yield anything close to that. And everyone knows this team doesn’t know how to score in even-strength situations.

Maybe the closest they came to that on this night was when Claude Giroux had the puck alone at the top of the slot. But he, too, took too long to shoot. And when he finally did Brodeur easily swallowed the shot.

Shortly thereafter, a Flyers turnover led to the D’Agostini goal ... and all was almost lost for the Flyers.